


A Promise that I Intend to Keep

by madame_faust



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe, Bearded Dwarf Women, Depression, Dwarves, Dwarves In Exile, F/F, Femslash, Mental Health Issues, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rule 63
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-07
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-01-07 20:41:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 8,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1124168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madame_faust/pseuds/madame_faust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just a collection of Rule 63!Dworin ficlets, drabbles and assorted snippets from a half-formed AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Nightmares

**Author's Note:**

> This first story was written for Ladynorthstar's Dworin challenge on Tumblr - write a ficlet, get a gorgeous piece of art, you can see mine here: http://ladynorthstar.tumblr.com/post/71994254578/for-the-dworin-challenge-pic-for-madame-fausts
> 
> The title comes from the Melissa Etheridge song, "I Take You with Me," a wonderful song that immediately brings Dworin to mind for me.
> 
> Quick note about names - I know that Dwarves' outer names are supposed to be indistinguishable by gender to outsiders so there's no need to change them for Rule 63 fic, but I do have a headcanon about how Dwarven outer names tend to work and it just felt odd to me to use canon names for the characters. It doesn't bother me when other writers do it, but it was something I didn't want to do myself, if that makes sense. So Dwalin has become Dwalldóra, Thorin is Thordís, Dís is Sigrin.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Warning for PTSD.**

Thordís of Erebor dreamt of heat and death. She woke surrounded by forge-hot limbs and twisted bedclothes. Blindly she writhed, choking, fighting her way out, it was dark, it was hot, all she could think was that she must get _out_ \- it was the brush of a hand against the flesh of her inner arm, a hand that had strength enough to tug her back into bed without strain no matter how much she fought, gently ghosting down her arm that made her pause as her bare feet landed on shockingly cold stone. 

“Sigrin,” she said, voice hovering on the edge of panic, but the bedframe creaked as the figure within it rolled over, bringing her a half-step closer to the present. 

“Is in the next room,” a low voice mumbled sleepily. “With his _wife_. D’you want me to get him.” 

Too young to be married. She’d said that once, when Sigrin announced his intentions to get properly engaged to his golden-haired miner, but he only smiled and embraced her and said that she worried too much and it was best to grab on to happiness when it was right in front of you, otherwise it might pass you by. He’d known so little of happiness in his short life. How could she fail to give her blessing?

“Go back to sleep,” Thordís gritted out roughly through her back teeth. The cold from the floor was seeping into her bones, chasing away all memory of dragonfire. It was winter in the Blue Mountains, not autumn in the East. 

“M’awake,” Dwalldóra insisted, but her eyes were closed and the only bit of her that wriggled its way out from under the blankets was her left arm, her hand still lightly brushing Thordís’s arm. “Where are you? Light a lamp.”

“I know where I am,” she replied, face flaming slightly with shame. “It was a...never mind. Never mind, just go back to sleep, Dór. I’m taking a walk.”

This time, Dór opened one of her eyes and even in the darkness, Thordís felt the skepticism in her gaze. The fingers around her wrist curled to hold on to her more securely and she did not pull away. 

“Come on, Dís,” she said with a touch of impatience. “It’s cold.”

It was cold. In those first awful moments upon waking she welcomed the cool air against her skin, but now it chilled her. There was a moment when she stood, tense and unwilling to give in so easily, worried about returning to a nightmare...but warm brown eyes won out against pride and the instant Thordís relaxed, she was pulled back, enveloped again in heat and strong limbs. This time she did not run away, but buried her face in Dór’s shoulder, shivering.

Lips pressed against her hair, then her brow when Thordís turned her face and scrubbed at her eyes. No tears had fallen, but she would not take the chance, not even here, not even now, not even with the one she called Beloved. Dór’s calloused fingers traced the line of her face, smoothed her beard and her lips kissed her nose, then her mouth.

Thordís kissed her back, softly at first, then with an almost palpable desperation. 

“I’m sorry I woke you,” she whispered against Dór’s mouth, wrapping her arms around her waist. The long ends of her unbound hair slipped through Thordís’s fingers. No shieldmaiden’s helms and chains here. The battle was years and miles away.

“S’alright,” Dór replied quietly. “Just hush. Go back to sleep. I’ve got you.”

The heat soothed now, the weight of bare, scarred skin and hard muscle was a comfort, not a vice. Thordís leaned into that promise of safety, even if she could not quite believe in it; for the moment it was enough and she slept. This time there were no nightmares.


	2. From 10,000 Miles Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I was listening to the Indigo Girls "Blood and Fire" and...this happened. This story takes place a few years before the first one.
> 
>   **Warning **for depression.****

_I’ll go somewhere where I can be of use._

The threat - oh, aye, it was a _threat_ \- rang in Thordís’s ears long after the door slammed and she was left alone to mend the bent hinges with an aching heart.

The way the door hung crooked in its frame ought to have been the least of her concerns when her heart threatened to beat itself out of her chest, but she needed some occupation. She couldn’t go running after her. All she would do was beg Dór to come back, but pleas never came easily from her. It would sound like a command and Dór would recoil from it, as was her right.

What was she, after all? Not a King. Not a commander of legions, not now, just a smith. And the only contract that existed between them was a contrast of words, hushed, mouthed against bare skin. The promise of a kiss. The unspoken vow of entwined limbs and the slide of hot flesh that said _I will never leave you._

‘Never’ was a fallacy. All the years Dís had passed wandering the wide world told her that nothing was permanent. Not home, not life, not love. Not even that.

Love had not kept her father from disappearing into the night, though if she was honest with herself she would admit that he had been getting further and further away from them for years. Love had not kept her mother from returning to the earth. And love would not keep Dór from feeling like her time was being wasted.

It began the morning Sigrin went to the forge past his usual time. It was one of those days that came with increasing frequency since her mother’s passing. Days when her limbs felt heavy as lead and she could not stir from bed, not for the promise of food or friends or work. Her brother left a cup of weak ale by her bed and kissed her on the forehead, like she was a child, before he left. She did not have it in her to feel grateful or insulted. 

Dór came at noontime; at least Dís imagined it was noontime, there were no windows in her room, no way to mark the passing of time save by the shadows that crept beneath the bedroom door. She had not seen them; eyes closed or open, her face stared at the wall. She brought food that went untouched. She spoke and received no response. Even when she crawled into bed behind Thordís, there was no responding shudder, the tense muscles did not lay down and relax. She blinked once or twice. And that was all.

Dwalldóra was a dwarf of action and Thordís was sure her inaction disgusted her. She rose eventually and left without a word. Just a kiss to the back of the head and Dís did not thank her for the gesture. She didn’t want it. She didn’t want anything, she did not even want to want. 

Sigrin did not come back until late, he didn’t lay beside her in the bed, he sat on the floor instead. Instead of the floor she stared at the back of his head. He hummed some fair ditty, deep voice rumbling in his narrow chest. He was so tall now, but still too thin, far too thin. They would lose work, if she remained like this.

It was the first thought she’d had all day, the first real thought that came despite her best efforts not to think. If she did not work, they would lose money. And Sigrin needed to eat even if she couldn’t.

Her hesitant fingers found their way into his hair, gripping thick black waves loosely. Sigrin stopped humming and turned toward her slightly with a hopeful smile on his face. 

Thordís couldn’t smile. But she took a sip from the cup he left her, rolled over and went to sleep. 

Two days later she scrubbed herself clean with icy water, donned a fresh tunic, shouldered her hammer and went to work. Dór had been oddly quiet and she hadn’t felt much like talking. Until Dór turned up on her doorstep after dark and said that once the busy season was over she might sign on to guard a merchant caravan on the way to the Khagolabbad Fahamu. So she could be _of use._

“I - I need you here,” Dís managed to say in an even voice, her words so clipped they sounded dismissive.

Dór snorted, “I’m a better sellsword than I am a smithy. The lad’s got years enough of work that you won’t miss me. You’re good at pretending I’m not here when I am, it shouldn’t trouble you overmuch.”

The ensuing row had been dreadful. Thordís shouted loudly enough to shake the bedrock about how she hadn’t any idea that Dwalldóra was such a dwarfling that she needed constant praise. Why should she go? Her place was here, among her own people, not defending foreign traders in foreign lands. 

Dór thundered just as fiercely that if _Dís_ got to go off on her own so much, why shouldn’t she have the chance to get away?

 _I never!_ Dís screamed, outraged. _I’ve never gone anywhere!_

_You do! You always have. If I don’t know that I can bring you back, I don’t know if I can take waiting for you anymore!_

The wrench skittered out of her grasp and fell to the floor. Thordís screwed up her face against unworthy tears. The words were true, weren’t they? She was so wrapped up in her own pain three days ago that she had done _nothing_ in response to an offer of love, freely given with an open heart. Not by her lover, anyway.

 _You left me._ It was the last thing Dór said before she was gone. _Why shouldn’t I leave you?_

Her heart was a battered, scarred, thing. Burned by dragonfire. Scarred by war. Hollowed by loss. How could she expect Dwalldóra to fight for such a worthless thing? How could she offer it herself? No smith ever fashioned a poorer courting gift.

The door was mended before Sigrin found his way home from the pub. Thordís hoped he remembered his key for no sooner had she fitted the door back on its hinges than she locked it securely behind her, flying through the dark, rain-slicked streets to the humble lodgings Dór shared with her sister. 

She stood in the rain for a long while before she worked up the nerve to go in. She stood even longer outside their door before she raised her fist to knock.

The action proved unnecessary for the door opened and the very dwarf she sought stood on the other side, taking in the sight of her, half dressed, dripping water from her hair and beard. She laughed, a short, barking sound. 

“What have you been doing?” she asked unnecessarily. “Standing in the rain? You’re unbelievable, Dís. Unbelievable.”

“I don’t want you to go,” she said, it was all she could say, all she needed to say before the door was slammed in her face, as she was sure it would be. “I need you, do you understand? I _need_ you.”

Dór stared at her for a long minute, her mouth a thin line above her beard. The expression in her eyes was guarded and Thordís felt the sinking tug of despair in her gut before Dór stepped back and let her in. 

“I reconsidered,” she said, without affect. “Pay wasn’t enough for what I’d be leaving behind.”

Thordís sagged and almost fell over, such was her relief. Dór caught her around the shoulders and looked at her with undisguised alarm. “When did you last eat?”

When her answer was too long in coming, she was steered into a chair by the fire and given toasted bread with cheese and ham; the grandest meal that Dór knew how to prepare. 

“Togs off,” she said, holding the plate of food hostage until her orders were followed. “Wear something of mine ‘til they dry. Or don’t.”

“Am I forgiven, then?” Dís asked, pulling her tunic over her head.

“There’s nothing to forgive,” Dór replied immediately, bending down to kiss Thordís before she started in on her supper. “I was being an arse. You can’t...I know you don’t mean it. Mean to. I know it’s worse for you than it is for me. I just don’t want to lose you.”

Her fingers ghosted over Dís’s short-cut beard, still wet from the rain. Cut for her home, her king, her sister, her parents. Lost. Was she lost?

“I find my way back,” she said, looking up at Dór seriously. “I do try. For you I try. For all of you.”

“I know,” she nodded sadly. “I know. Go on, eat up. It’d make a liar of me if I blathered on about how much I missed you just to have you keel over from lack of victuals.”

Thordís never did put on one of Dór’s tunics. She didn’t have to. There was warmth and heat enough in the shelter of her dearest love and dearest friend’s arms to ward off the cold and wet. She filled Dór’s restless arms and bathed in warmth, comfort and passion, found her way back again.


	3. Childhood/Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This next series of ficlets are written for prompts for Dworin Week - first one is 'Childhood/Memories.' Our lovely ladies are age-equivalent 15/16. This is probably only a few months before the dragon came.

Being thrown on your arse in the dirt again and again shouldn’t have done much for her morale, but somehow Dís was smiling even after Dór got her pinned  _again_.

“‘Least you’ve kept your humor about it,” she said, squeezing Dís’s wrists before she stood and extended a hand to help the princess to her feet. “That’s about the only thing you’ve _ever_ kept your humor about.”

"Ey!" Dís exclaimed indignantly. Her smile turned sharp and she pulled Dór toward her with a mighty tug.

Dór tried to steady herself but it was all for naught; she wound up on her back, this time with Dís on top of her, sitting on her hips with a smug smile on her face. Dór decided she liked the chagrined little smile she’d worn earlier rather better than her current smirk.

Dís had enjoyed a growth spurt recently, but one of Dór’s hands could still wrap around her skinny wrists and she flipped her over, pinning her down. Her hair hung down to her waist, having shaken itself free of her clasps ages ago. It tickled Dís’s chest and she squirmed a little, smile vanishing, replaced by teeth biting into her lower lip.

Oh. _Oh._ Well. Wasn’t that something?

Dór drew back a bit, the tight grip with which she held Dís easing a bit.

"Or," she said with a breathlessness that had nothing to do with fighting, "Could be it’s naught to do with your humor at all. Could be you like having a bit of a close tumble."

"Close tumble?" Dís raised her eyebrows and smiled again.

"Rough cuddle?"

"Ooh, pick that one out of one of your Ma’s books, did you?" Dís was laughing now, but she hadn’t said no, had she?

"Give me a bit, I’ll recite you an ode," Dór said, glancing round the empty practice green. The moonlight shined down through the aperture in the ceiling, making Dís’s eyes glitter. "Well?"

Dís followed her gaze. “Not here.”

She looked a bit shy, then, like the wee lass who walked two steps behind Dór for all their lives and took her hand when the crowds in the corridors got too dense. She’d found her voice and her courage once they’d begun training with the Guard, but Dór still remembered speaking up on her best friend’s behalf when they were little. Used to drive her mother to distraction, but when Dís was much younger, she would whisper her words into Dór’s ear and let her friend speak for her.

Bashful, she was. But Thordís, Princess of Erebor, firstborn of Prince Thráin and Princess Freya, first daughter born to Durin’s direct line in three generations could not be bashful. She was to be as the Mountain itself - unyielding, strong, upright. Mountains did not hold hands, Mountains did not hide behind taller friends, and they did  _not_ shirk when they’d been issued a challenge. Even as soft a challenge as Dór’s offer of ode-reciting. 

Dór let her up and followed Dís now, and it was  _Dór’s_ thick fingers that twined with Dís’s slenderer hands as she was led into an antechamber. Licking her lips, Dís averted her eyes for only a second in the cool darkness, then lifted herself up on her toes, as she’d once done when she was whispering secrets into her best friend’s ear. It was Dór’s mouth her lips found now and she kissed her, bold as anything. And if a bit of a bashful flush creeped its way up her neck, it was too dark to notice and they were too occupied to care.


	4. War

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dworin Week - Prompt 2: War **Warning for canonical character death, self-loathing and survivor's guilt.**

The price of war was paid in blood. So much of it soaked the ground that Thordís thought it would seep forth, flowing like lava until the survivors were drowned along with their dead. Yet the scorched earth of Dimrill Dale soaked in the gore until the dirt turned a muddy black and red. It clung to Thordís’s boots, sinking her lower and lower with every step, threatening to pull her down among the glorious slain she removed from where they were tangled with the bodies of their enemies.

The earth took their blood, the sky took their ashes. The winds blew hard that day, sending flame soaring until it seemed the very heavens would burn. Dís wished they would. Would  _that_  be enough to rouse their Maker’s notice? 

The din of battle had not been. Nor the screams of the dying. But, she remembered, they always made their offerings in the Temple fires. Perhaps this last, great sacrifice, this burnt offering of His sons and daughters would at last give them some sign that they were not forsaken. It was said, when the exiles walked forth from Khazad-dûm, it rained for a year, as if the Maker poured out his grief in great tears that fell ceaselessly from His celestial forge.

But the sky was blue, the sun burned hot, and Dís could not even make herself weep; her eyes were too dry for tears, her throat too raw for sobs. 

She had known how to weep once, hadn’t she? In the still, tense nights under open sky, she’d dropped silent tears onto her little brother’s head, tucked under her chin. She’d kept Sigrin wrapped up tight in her arms, but he still shivered in his sleep. 

_Bag o’bones,_  Fredís always teased, snatching him round the waist, lifting him up, spinning him round.  _Careful! A stiff breeze might blow you away from us, then where would we be?_

The wind shifted. Ash blew in a great gust, settling in Dís’s hair, coating the back of her tongue. She gagged on it. 

_Why_  had she let her come? It was Dís’s sworn duty to follow in her grandmother’s footsteps, the soldier, the defender of their home and people. Fredís was meant to tread a gentler path. To learn their mother’s craft, to adorn the Mountain with beautiful things, to fill the corridors with her merry laughter and jolly ways, a light in the darkness. She’d learned to fight to save herself, to hold off an attacker until she could flee, but there was no  _fleeing_  from the field of combat. Not unless one was a coward. And Fredís had never been a coward.

_You’re not a warrior,_  Dís had growled as she repaired the makeshift armor she’d cobbled together the night before the battle.

_Neither were you,_  her sister said.  _Not seven years ago you weren’t, not a proper one._

_You aren’t old enough._

_You’re not so old,_  Fredís insisted stubbornly, belying the number of times she’d rolled her eyes at her elder sister, declared her a miserable bastard, a humorless old crone.  _I’ve got to do something. I want to help._

There was a fierceness in her sister’s demeanor that surprised Thordís. Fredís had always been full of bluster since she’d been a tiny thing insisting on riding her own pony, though her legs did not reach the stirrups. But this was no exaggerated boastfulness, no dramatic playacting to get what she wanted. She seemed determined. She seemed immovable. She reminded Thordís of herself. And so she agreed and intervened with their father on her behalf and now…

Now there was only bloody earth and blue sky and hot ash. 

In the days that followed, the days of healing before the caravans left (they too would leave this place ere long, North, South, East, West, anywhere but _home_ ). There was a coronation of sorts for her father. Their people pledged him their fealty, but there was no crown to place upon his sunburnt and creased brow; it had been lost long ago, even before the Pale Orc took her grandfather’s head and she took his life.

They called her a hero for that.  _Oakenshield_  after a bit of mid-battle desperation, the story of which had gotten out of hand. Dís hadn’t tongue enough to correct them. What had she done, really? Saved her own miserable skin when she ought to have saved her sister’s life. 

What sort of hero could she be? Not like her grandmother, the Dragonslayer, whose body and face were notched with the proud wounds of a thousand battles over which she had been the victor. There was hardly a mark on her, despite seven years of warfare and struggle. 

Not like Dór, who’d killed ten times the number of enemies that Dís had sunk her blade into. Dór lay in a pallet in the healer’s tents for days, in enforced slumber while the grisly wound that nearly cleaved her head and two was stitched and her sister hovered round, worrying over whether or not she’d lose the eye. 

Dís hovered too, nearby, like a spectre, the ghost she wished she was. She still had not wept, even when Dór opened her unbandaged eye, seized her hand clumsily and slurred, “Wasn’t your fault, love.”

Dís dropped her hand and ran from the healer’s tents, thinking that _then_  she might cry at last. But she didn’t. Her eyes were dry, her heart was heavy, and her heart felt as if it was being squeezed in her chest. Maybe it was shriveling, as the last bit of anything good in her had died on the battlefield. 

Not quite the  _last_  thing. Sigrin cried enough for both of them. He tried to hide it when he saw her coming, drawing his sleeve roughly over his face, casting his eyes down in the dirt. She knew he thought she was the brave one, so strong. So stoic. 

So guilty. 

She avoided him, avoided them all. She worked, tried to make herself useful as a pair of hands since the heart that went with them was all but gone. 

Their comrades in arms left. Some bid her father a cordial farewell. Others spit in his face. Dís tried not to watch, she was loading carts in the ever-blazing sun, stopping every so often to wipe the sweat from her brow. If a passerby was watching, the drops that poured endlessly down her face, disappearing into her beard, might have been taking for tears.

A heavy hand fell on her shoulder. She tensed, then turned, not relaxing an inch when she saw who it was looming over her. The bandages were gone, but the scar was thick, puckered and very red still, but Dór had both her eyes. 

"Come on," she said, hand sliding down Dís’s arm until she caught her wrist. 

"Where?" Dís asked dully, roughly. It had been days since she’d spoken to anyone.

"Away."

Not very far away, but they walked through the winding tents, past the burnt-out cooking fires. There had been a line of trees delineating the forest nearby, but they had been cut for the pyres. No one marked their progress away from the camp; why would they? 

Dór let her go, folding her arms over her chest in a familiar expectant gesture, but Dís hardly knew what she was waiting for. They stood in silence, apart, Dís staring at the top of Dór’s boots, Dór staring at the top of her bent head. 

After a moment, Dís looked up. “I’m sorry for…” 

_Your father,_  she wanted to say because she hadn’t yet and she should. But try as she might, the words, like the tears, wouldn’t come. 

"I’m sorry for…" she tried again. Still noting. 

"I’m…" her breathing was coming quick, too quick, she’d been too much in the heat, she was getting dizzy. "I’m…"

Dór grabbed her before she fell on the ground. Dís sagged against her, arms pinned to her sides, gasping for air, wheezing, choking and then, at last, weeping. 

"I’m sorry," she managed. "I’m so sorry."

"I know," Dór said, crushing her close. “I know.”


	5. Food

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dworin Week, Prompt 3 - 'Food'

It was Lóra who suggested bringing over the bread. 

"We’ve got to do something," she mumbled, wrapping it up in a piece of cloth to prevent it getting too hard. "Neither of us have any talent for cookery, I stopped by the bakery on my way back from the library, you ought to bring it by on the morrow."

Ballóra had a way of making suggestions sound like orders. Dór very clearly heard ‘ought’ as ‘must’ regardless of the word that actually left her sister’s mouth. She was a tiny, tart little thing, having inherited her mother’s stature and good looks, their father’s aura of intimidation, and their Uncle Haldr’s inability to suffer fools. 

"I’ll bring it by now," Dór said, picking up the loaf off the table. In all the confusion, she doubted anyone had thought to get supper started; their cousins weren’t Made for cookery any more than they were.

Lóra, lightning-quick, grabbed the end of the loaf and looked her sister seriously in the eyes. “Do  _not,”_  she said warningly, “say a  _word_  about Thráin.”

Dór snorted and gave the loaf an experimental tug, but Lóra held firm.

"I mean it. Whatever you think you might have to say can wait…indefinitely. It won’t bring him back and it won’t do  _any_  of them good to hear it.”

"Perhaps I ought to have said it to his face then," Dór growled. "When he was around to hear it."

"Perhaps," Lóra owned. "But you didn’t and he’s gone. And your railing against him to the Maker’s celestial forge is the  _last_  thing Dís and Sigi need to hear right now.”

"What about Freya?"

"She’ll rail enough for both of you," Lóra predicted grimly, relinquishing the bread. “Off you go. Remember - not a word.”

She had words alright, but she swallowed them. It was all she could do to contain her fury. How  _dare_  he? How  _dare_  he forsake his family and his people and his  _duty?_

Oh, aye, she knew he was miserable here. Thráin had been a miserable bastard for as long as Dór had known him, long before the Mountain fell. Taciturn, dissatisfied, melancholy. Nearly silent all these years, except to argue with his wife - but for the fact that he was a King, she was sure he would have gotten the entire family booted out of the flat for the rows he and Freya had. Really, they ought to have charged for the privilege of watching, taken bets as to who was going to throw what first. It would have been a bit of added income to help make up for the fact that, by airing their dirty laundry in public at all hours, they weren’t doing their people any favors.

Dór hoped that Dís and Sigi weren’t taking it too hard, though she knew they must be, even if he didn’t deserve it. She didn’t much care how Freya was feeling; her opinion of her Queen-in-Exile was only slightly higher than that of her King. At least Freya remained and didn’t leave the burden of rule to fall on the shoulders of a lad of fewer than seventy-five years. Sigrin couldn’t even sign a contract, let alone take care of a people, even one as lowly and degraded as they. 

When Thráin ran, she hoped he ran  _far._  If Dór ever laid eyes on him again she’d have more than a few choice words to lob in his direction. 

The flat was oddly quiet when she knocked on the door; she didn’t know if it was a good omen or a bad one.

Sigi opened the door almost immediately for all the good it did; he just about filled the frame up. Dór had no idea when it was she started having to look  _up_  at him, but it didn’t much matter. He was still a lad, after all. Too young for his father to do a runner on him. The proper thing to do, she supposed, would be to bow before him and pledge fealty, but she didn’t much care about that either. Poor lad looked as if he could use a hug and that was just what she did. 

"You know your Da’s a bastard, right?" she whispered in his ear, forgetting Lóra’s words in an instant.

Sigi made a noise that might have been a chuckle under better circumstances. “Nah. Umad and Udad were married before he came along. Is that bread?”

 "It is," she said, pulling back and handing it over. "Baked it myself."

 This time, Sigi did laugh. 

 "Oh, sure you did." Chancing a glance beneath the cloth, he raised his eyebrows. "And I suppose Alfi’s hired you on? As the bread bears  _his_  mark. You - you can’t mean to say you’re leaving us too?”

It was clear he meant it as a joke, but Dór saw the anxiety in his eyes, heard the hitch in his voice. She shook her head at once and gave his arm as squeeze. “Nah. Never. You can stake your life on that, laddie.” 

"Are we taking wagers?"

A cheery little brogue interrupted them and Dór stepped aside so that Vilný could come in. She smiled and hitched her shoulders in an apologetic shrug. “Door was open, so I wandered in a wee bit…I could wander out if you’re…”

She trailed off, looking between Sigi and Dór a little uncertainly. She’d clearly just come from work, there was grit from the mines on her clothes and in her beard, but she’d washed her face and hands before she came calling. Sigi lit up like a beacon on seeing her. 

"No, no, it’s fine," he said. 

"Good!" Vilný exclaimed brightly, smiling up at him. “I got to thinking it’d been a long while since I taked a walk with me favorite smith - ah, no offence meant - “

"Don’t worry about it," Dór said, managing a smirk for the lass. She was a pleasant enough girl, if a little too ceaselessly optimistic. “Go on, I’ve another call to pay myself.”

"Dís is in our room,” Sigi said, handing the bread back. He lowered his voice and added, “Get her to eat summat, eh? I’ve been trying, but it’s like talking to stone - “

"Aye, aye," she reached up to ruffle his hair reassuringly. "I’ll see it done. Go on, then. Have a good walk."

"We will!" Vilný declared, hanging off Sigi’s arm and tugging him toward the door. “Good long one, the leaves are turning gem-pretty, you know, it can almost make a body fond o’trees. Bildr’s first batch o’cider ought be ready for pressing any day now - oh! I owe you a drink, don’t I owe you a drink?”

Sigrin allowed himself to be led out the door as Vilný chattered away about absolutely nothing. Dís wasn’t fond of idle chatter, which was good because Dór wasn’t very good at offering it. She spared a half a glance at the closed door that led to Freya’s room, but only half. Serves her right for holing up in her room like a rat. Her husband might have deserted them all, but she still had children to see to. It seemed to Dór she’d forgotten that somewhere along the way. 

Dís’s door was closed as well, but it opened when Dór tried the lock. Dís didn’t look up when she entered. She was curled on her side on top of the bed, facing the wall. She didn’t move when Dór sat down beside her or when she curled up behind her. When Dór pressed a kiss to the back of her neck, she tensed. Then spoke.

"Let’s not get married."

Dór blinked, sure she’d misheard. “Beg pardon?”

Dís swallowed hard, still staring at the wall. “I don’t want to get married.”

Right. That was what Dór thought she’d said. Though  _why_  she’d said it was still a mystery. They’d discussed marriage, but never seriously. Just idle chatter, really. What they’d wear in their hair (silver and sapphires for Dís, gold and rubies for Dór), which of their relations would cry (they’d come to the conclusion that Dór’s parents would have cried enough for everyone, had they been alive to witness the blessed, imaginary event). But they had no money, no possessions, nothing to draw a contract over, so they’d never thought to pursue it beyond occasional daydreams. There was the question of children, but it was a question neither of them had an answer to. 

"Alright…" Dór said cautiously, ignoring the feeling of her stomach dropping into her bowels. "What’s that mean, then?"

"Just what I said," Dís replied without turning around. “It’s…not for me. I don’t think. It doesn’t mean anything, does it? Not without property or inheritance. There’s no…there isn’t a point.”

_Just because it didn’t mean anything to your parents…_  Dór bit down hard on her tongue to keep from giving her thoughts voice. Sigi might have managed a smile, but she knew Dís wouldn’t. She’d always thought her father hung the moon and laid the diamonds in the rock. Any time he was out of sorts, she’d blamed herself and she was just the same about her mother. Rotten. Downright villainous that he’d taken such affection and squandered it. “I’m not going anywhere. You understand that?”

Dís didn’t say anything and it was then that Dór sat up, anger flashing in her eyes as she hauled her up, gripping her by the shoulders so they faced each other. “Don’t you dare - don’t you  _dare_  measure me by him. It’s cruel. You hear me, Dís? It’s a wicked thing to think and I won’t have it.”

"I’m sorry," Dís said, tilting her chin up to look Dór in the eyes, “that I’m cruel.”

Dór kissed her then, hard enough that her teeth drew blood from her own lips. “It’s not you who’s the cruel one and we both know it.”

Dís went quiet again, but she made no move to lay herself back down. 

"Come along." She took Dís’s upper arm in a bruising grip and lifted her off the bed. 

"Where are we going?"

Something about the question nagged at Dór’s mind like a memory, another day, another tragedy, but she brushed it aside. No use dwelling on past wrongs when fresh ones daily lurked to do them in. “Kitchen. You’ve got to eat something. Sigi’s orders.”

Dís opened her mouth, but whatever retort she was about to make was never voiced. “And he is King.”

"He’s your brother," Dór said shortly. “And he’s worried. Come  _along_ , there’s bread. I made it myself.”

Dís’s lips quirked up, just for an instant before the almost-smile vanished. “Liar.”

Dór got her in a headlock and kissed the top of her head ferociously. _"Your_  liar. And don’t you forget it.” 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dworin Week - Day 3, Prompt 'Family'

The baby smiled at absolutely everyone and everything, without prejudice. Filný smiled at Sigrin and Vilný, of course, but that mightn't be a sign of any particular partiality. Filný smiled at the merchants shouting about the goods for sale in their stalls. Filný smiled at the cats that occasionally escape the grainery to roam the streets.

 

Dís was sure that Filný was too young to differentiate much between them, but Dór smugly maintained that  _she_ was the child’s favorite. She didn’t have the heart to tell her that the toothless smile, outstretched arms, and dimpled cheeks that greeted Dór every time she entered the flat was the child’s standard greeting. 

 

Sigrin didn’t help quell the delusion. “Who’s that?’ he whispered in the baby’s ear when the two of them looked up and saw Dór. “Is that one of your favorite aunties come to call?”

 

"Favorite," Dór corrected him, lifting Filný into her arms, then tossing the pudgy darling (very gently) into the air, prompting giggles. “Isn’t that so? Can you say  **most favored**?”

 

She was destined to be disappointed, Filný wasn’t saying anything yet, in the Common Tongue or Khuzdul, but the lot of them held out hope that one of their names would be the child’s first word.

 

"C’mon, I know you’ve got it in you!" Sigi encouraged her lifting the child up so high the poor thing’s head was in danger of brushing the ceiling, but of course it never did. "A _dad._   Adad!”

 

Filný'd blow spit bubbles until Vilný sidled up next to them, poking Sigi in the side to make him relinquish the child to her arms.

 

"A _ma_ d!" she’d correct as she whirled baby in her arms. "Go on, then. Amad!"

 

Dís pretended to be quite above all this nonsense. The babe would talk eventually, surely, and there was precious little any of them could to to hasten the coming of speech…but on those days when Dís was left alone to mind the babe for a few hours, she’d kiss Filný’s fat little face and whisper, “You can manage Dís, can’t you? It’s just one sound, after all, not too difficult.”

 

Filný smiled, tangling hands in her hair, the same as when any of them were being silly about prompting speech in the child. Gurgles and soft coos were the best the little mite could manage and, really, they were satisfied with that. 

 

Hmm. Satisfaction. What a notion.

 

It was an evening like any other until Sigrin started choking on his supper. It was entirely Vilný’s fault, as she was possessed of a bizarre temperament that managed to find joy in everyday occurrences, she’d managed to build up a bit of a blind spot about good news. She failed to realize that there were certain joyful pronouncements that ought not be made casually, just after one’s spouse is in the midst of swallowing a mouthful of lamb.

"All goes well, next summer we’ll have another wee one," she informed the table brightly, bouncing Filný on her knee and dragging her own supper through a smear of mustard on her plate. She hadn’t had time to lick her finger clean before she was pounding Sigi on the back. Dís fared rather better; she only dropped her knife on the floor, then cracked heads with Dór when they both bent to retrieve it at the same time.

 

"You two don’t waste time, do you?" Dór muttered, rubbing her brow, but she was smiling. "Well done. Just keep up a steady supply of little ones to play with and I’ll keep bringing supper by."

 

“‘Course we will!” Sigi grinned. He’d caught his breath, but still looked a little dazed. “What other reason could there be to have children? Another one, eh? That’s…something.”

 

"Muhudel," Dís smiled, leaning over to give Sigi a kiss on the cheek. She’d have done the same to Vilný if the lass let her, but she and her kinfolk were fonder of embraces than anything and Dís was swept up in a hug before she had a moment to wish her sister-in-law all due congratulations.

It was a blessing indeed, one Dís could scarce believe. Little Filný was only just three years old, to have two so close together was something akin to a miracle, Fredís and Sigrin had been thought close in age and there were more than fifteen years between them. Silently, she prayed to the Maker that the Men’s crops would flourish and their people’s trade and industry would prosper. Providing for two little ones would be no easy feat otherwise.

"Anytime you start pining for your craft, just let me know," Dór remarked casually. “I could put by my hammer if you need childminding done.”

"I were counting on it," Vilný winked. “And, of course, I’d not say thee nay if you was of a mind to give ours another cousin or two…”

She trailed off and gave Sigrin a significant look; evidently this was something the pair of them had talked about. Dór quirked a curious eyebrow, but Dís went rigid in her chair, all the color draining from her cheeks.

"If you want," Sigrin added. "If it was something that crossed your minds, someday, I mean. Happy to help."

It was common enough, if two bearing dwarves wanted a child for a family member of one side to provide necessary assistance. It was practically _the_ thing to do amongst the nobility for the preservation of the bloodline. _Until Durin wakes again from sleep…_

It was a credit to Dór’s abilities of perception - or a mark of how very long she and Dís had known one another - that she didn’t let the momentary silence stretch on too long.

"Might do," she shrugged. "Then again, there’s a benefit to the sort you can give back when they’re too troublesome - that’s the kind my sister likes best, especially if they can walk and talk and take themselves to the necessary."

"So Lóra wouldn’t put aside her books for an afternoon with two screaming babes?” Sigi asked, his voice full of ironic amazement.

"I wouldn’t wager anything you liked on the odds," Dór winked and they carried on with supper as if nothing at all out of the ordinary had been suggested.

Sigi and Vilný left afterwards to spread the joyful news to Herdr and Glóva (naturally, Vilný hadn’t been able to keep her mouth shut around her own cousins, so Bola was the first to know and it was a sure thing that she’d babbled all about it to Bomla, Tyfi, and Bilna…and probably half the pub by now).

They left Filný in Dór and Dís’s capable hands. The child dropped off to sleep almost at once, snuggled against Dór’s chest. It was only once Filný had been laid in the cot and a door shut between them that Dór spoke to Dís.

"Right, out with it," Dór said, crouching down before Dís’s armchair. She looked up at her with the light of the fire reflected in her dark eyes. “You’ve been sitting there all night, like…you look upset. Why?”

Dís slunk down unhappily in her seat. “You want children,” she said, more steadily than she expected.

Dór’s eyebrows drew down over the bridge of her nose. “And you don’t? You _adore_ Filný - “

"Aye, I do," Dís agreed at once. “Of _course_ I do - and this is not the life an heir to the throne of Erebor ought to live, not a life I’d want for my - for _our - “_

It wasn’t the grandest gesture, it didn’t solve anything, but as she often did when she thought Dís was working herself into a fit, she closed the gap between them and kissed her into silence.

"Dís,” she breathed, leaning her forehead against her beloved’s. “You’ve got to stop doing this to yourself.”

"Doing what?" Dís asked, squeezing her eyes shut, clenching her hands against the arms of the chair.

"Making yourself miserable over nothing. And…this might not be what you want. This life. What _any_ of us want. But you can’t just stop living until the Mountain is reclaimed. Because - “

"Don’t," Dís couldn’t wriggle away, she was all but pinned to the chair. “Don’t say it can’t be done.”

"That’s not what I…" Dór trailed off and pulled back. “Aye, I’d like a child. Of our own, I won’t lie about that or pretend it isn’t so. But there’s no reason to get in a snit about it.”

"Isn’t there?" Dís asked, getting up and pacing away. She was mindful of the child sleeping in the next room, she kept her voice down and her footfalls light, but there was no denying the tension in her voice, in her stance. “And I don’t think I’d…what kind of mother could I be then? Rotten moods and misery.”

"You’ve done alright with Filný - “

"I haven’t," Dís shook her head, lips pressed together tightly. “Vilný and Sigrin have done well - amazingly. They…supply for the deficiencies of this life. I couldn’t. I’m so - “

"Don’t make me kiss you again," Dór said warningly. Then she opened her arms. “Come here. Come _along,_ now.”

  
_Shove her away,_ Dís thought, hesitating. _Order her out. Let her find someone else. Someone who deserves her._

But she was weak. She had always been weak. And she allowed the kindest and best of dwarves to envelop her in a comforting embrace. Dís melted into it, as if she never meant to leave the circle of Dór’s arms and she thought, _She ought to be a mother._

"If anyone else talked about you that way, I’d break their hands, or worse," Dór said quietly. "But I can’t do that to you - well, I _could…”_

"Hush," Dís mumbled into Dór’s shoulder, arms tightening around her waist.

"You hush," Dór kissed her. "We’ve got time, haven’t we? And it’s as I said - your wee brother and his little wife are keeping us well stocked in younglings. This is a happy day - "

"Don’t spoil it?" Dór paused thoughtfully, then nodded, “Aye, sounds about right to me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone wondering about the lack of gendered pronouns for the baby - Fili is one character whose gender I didn't actually swap. He's a bearing dwarf in this 'verse (capable of conceiving and bearing a child), but he's going to identify as male once he gets a little bit older. I didn't want to misgender him over and over again, but as this is from Auntie Dís's POV and most bearing dwarves do identify as female, that's what she'd go with until realized that wasn't the case with Filny. Once he's a little older, he'll go by 'Filrin.'


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dworin Week, Day 5 - Prompt 'AU'

For the fifth time in an hour Dór found herself about to speak to Dís only to realize a heartbeat after she drew breath that it _wasn't_ Dís. Only it was. But not hers. By the Maker, she needed a drink.

The he face was a dead match, but she was taller, her hair boasted far less silver, her brow was less lined and she smiled reflexively every time Dór locked eyes with her. That settled it, if nothing else; Dís hardly ever smiled and surely not for so paltry a cause as Dór glancing in her direction. This lass was called 'Sigdís' - she'd learned that in the period of odd calm that followed after exclamations, accusations, and general chaos that ruled after darkness fell and fourteen dwarves (and one halfling) crashed into the forest out of nowhere. 

When it came out that these strangers were led by a fellow named Thor _in_ , that they'd been passing through the Misty Mountains in the company of a wizard, and that their numbers also consisted of fourteen dwarves and one halfling...well, everyone got oddly quiet for a bit.

Dór didn't understand it - right, that wasn't entirely accurate, she did understand it, she just didn't _want_ to understand it, so she stayed on the fringes of the group, counting heads and tried her best to neither scream nor laugh. 

Just their luck that the wizard had disappeared. Not that Dór had high hopes for his usefulness; if he could make a measly summer storm let up, what were the chances he'd manage to sort this mess out?

It was like something out of a truly dreadful piece of theatre. Two Kings, traveling with their sisters and their closest kin and kith, far from any respectable settlement of dwarrowkind. Of course, such plays usually ended with some manner of group wedding, counterpart fitted to counterpart and Dór couldn't see that happening here. At the very least, she had no interest in speaking to the big fellow with the bald head and twin axes who stuck to little Sigi's twin like a second shadow. 

The twin was the one they called Thorin and he was to their Sigrin as his sister was to Thordís, but Dór didn't think for a moment that she'd mix up the two of them. In the first place, Sigrin was taller and broader (even more so than the bald fellow, who didn't much seem to like that) and in the second, despite their long, skinny noses, the same mess of fine dark hair tumbling over their shoulders and the same sharp features, neither their bearings nor their expressions had anything in common. 

This Thorin seemed like a cornered beast who was ready to strike and Sigi was having a rough go of it trying to pry a few words out of him. The lad's eyebrows were inching ever closer to his hairline and, in contrast to his double's ever-present scowl, his mouth was dropping open in slack-jawed disbelief. More and more his eyes darted to Lóra, silently asking her to make sense of it, but Dór's sister was chewing her tongue and matching Thorin scowl-for-scowl.

"What are you and yours doing out here?" Sigrin asked, glancing round at all of them, clearly a wee bit dazed.

Thorin was silent, but a white-haired fellow with a mendacious manner spoke for him. "We are merely merchants traveling East, to meet our kin in the Iron Hills."

"Liar," Lóra said succinctly, glaring up at the short-statured fellow through her spectacles. "Where are your carts, your wagons, your _goods_ for that matter? And your guards - ah, no, before you say anything terribly stupid - "

This last was directed to the bald-headed dwarf who'd opened his mouth apparently intending to compound his companion's deceit. 

" - three warriors is not sufficient guard for a caravan that intends to cross a continent."

Ballóra was a very, very wise 'dam, just like her mother. Unlike her mother, she did not trade in anything like tact and Halldóra's natural sweetness of nature had completely passed her eldest girl over entirely. 

"So," Lóra concluded. "Let's try that again shall we: what is your business out in the wilds?"

"We might ask you what yours is," Sigdís asked, with a bit of heat in her voice. "Seeing as it was _our_ camp you stumbled into."

Sigi seemed to find wisdom in that and after a second of thinking it over her shrugged and said, "Fair enough - "

Dís spoke up sharply and only _just_ managed to refrain from smacking him, "Sigi!"

"What?" he asked, baffled. "All the Seven Kingdoms know, don't they?"

"That's not the _point -"_

As Dís seemed to be taking the reins, Dór turned her attention back to the others, frowning; where had the younglings got to?

She hoped they were with their Ma - Vilný had a voice like a bellows, although she was short, she was easy to pick out in a crowd. True to form, at the moment, she seemed to be trying to make friends.

"You say you're from the Blue Mountains? What do you know, _I'm_ from the Blue Mountains meself!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all I've got, unfortunately. If I sat down and really gave it my all, we could have another long fic on our hands...gah, there's SO MUCH to talk about. Like how Lóra and Mistress Baggins would be immediate BFFs because they're so sick of everyone's shit. And Herdr and Tyfi get to come (Glóva and Bomla are staying at home, sadly, but who doesn't want dude!Hervor and dude!Thyra on a Quest?). And in this particular 'verse, the young prince and princess are very much NOT WANTED ALONG by Daddy, so Auntie Dís had to do some meddling so the kiddos can come and Sigrin is PISSED...yeah, lots to say.


End file.
